Recent Moments of (Gadget) Weakness

Yesterday, I bought a fitbit Surge after reading all about the watches on display at CES.  Today, I ordered an Amazon Echo.  The latter won't be here until mid-year, but I'm expecting the Surge in about a week.  I'll be posting shortly when I've had a chance to gain some experience with it.

Another CES Has Come and Gone

So I have let CES 2015 go by without any comment.  Partially because I've been distracted with work and partially because I was waiting to see what all would be reported on, given that I'm not lucky enough to make it out there.  Here is my (non-exhaustive) take on some of the cooler products or categories that made it to CES (or at least reported on in concert with CES) this year:

Food Robots

I think that this is a separate category from appliances.  And these are a good bit more interesting (at least to me) than the bread makers of the late '80s that took my neighborhood by storm.

Rotimatic

Great product video walking you through why you need one.  I'm not Indian, but I don't think it matters.  Sounds like a great idea.  If you eat rotis routinely, $600 probably doesn't seem too bad.

Cooki Robotic Chef

The concept is fantastic: pop a bunch of pre-measured, fresh ingredients into a machine, set the time that you'd like the meal to be ready, and it is done.  If you are really lazy, you can order the pre-measured ingredients from their website.  Pretty cool.  Sort of.  And keep in mind that the product has not actually launched yet.

As conceived, this is a single pan meal maker.  That can mix up the ingredients with a spinning robotic spatula.  To me, it looks more concept than useful approach to robotically crafted meals.  Like bread machines, this product's limited usefulness will likely mean that it is no more than a fad device (like buying a juicer - you'll use it for a few months and then it will make its way to the back of your cabinet and ultimately to a garage sale when your children are moving you out of your house, you hoarder).

This is a very cool initial effort.  Hopefully, it gains some traction and attention and spurs further development.  Here are a few thoughts on how this device could go a Step Beyond:

• Add ability to pop in standard-sized cans.  I know that they are going for fresh ingredients, but for most of us, we use canned goods at least occasionally.  Ideally, the machine would remove the lid and ensure that the can was empty (which for something like cream of mushroom soup, isn't as easy at it first seems).
• Add the ability to use ground beef.  Imagine that they provide containers into which you put your ground beef before freezing.  Then, on the morning of the day you want your meal, you put the frozen container into the cooking robot.  The compartment is insulated enough that the beef is unfrozen only just in time to be used in the meal.
• Bonus points if the robot can drain excess fat from browning the beef.

Wearables

Tons of them.  Of every shape and size (well, really only small and small-ish).  The key addition in the current generation, I think, is all day heart rate monitoring.  This is a bit of a deal, I think and I'm going to be jumping on the band-wagon shortly.

Some of the more intriguing ones, IMHO:

• General fitness trackers: I don't see anything that differs in a substantial way from my fitbit One, which I've been wearing for two years.  Dear industry, I don't want to wear something on my wrist, but I will if you make me.
• AmpStrip: takes the fitness tracker a bit further.  Includes skin temperature, respiration and posture.  I'm pretty sure that I don't want to have this thing stuck to my skin all of the time.  But maybe it's worthwhile?  Certainly having a consumable (the stickers) makes this product's long-term viability better.
• Watches: really not that exciting.  Watches have been dying as a category, it feels to me like smart watches are jumping on to a sinking ship.  But they do add some compelling information.  Skin temperature and sweat should be part of it.
• Brain Manipulators: Thync.  Sign me up.  In fact, I have signed up.  Especially if there is one to make me smarter.

Virtual Reality Tools

Good to see that there are some seemingly legit competitors to facebook's Oculus Rift.  Sony's Project Morpheus, Razer's OSVR, and Sulon Cortex appear to be three.  I'm waiting for this to be "normal".  Personally, I'd prefer the option to have augmented reality, not just virtual reality.  And no, I don't believe any of the 90's movies where my soul will get sucked into the virtual world.  I'm not worried.  But bring on the fun.

Smart Appliances

Totally underwhelmed here.  Samsung's keynote was a real bore.  Sure, iPhone/Android control of my washer machine would be useful - oh wait - no it wouldn't at all.  Very little information to be gained by these, I think.  And I'm pretty sure that the manufacturer is going to try to control all of that information.

Autos

Moving slowly, as I think it must for safety and reliability purposes.  Nothing will excite me in this category until I sit in the backseat of my car and am chauffeured to work.  I do expect new cars to have ever larger LCD displays, though.  Probably bodes well for car interfaces, though car companies seem to excel at doing interfaces badly.